“I often recommend to people, even if they never have the opportunity, hopefully never have the opportunity to use kickboxing or Brazilian jiu jitsu or some martial art outside of a practice environment that they should train because the way they will carry themselves through the world — male, female, it doesn’t matter; age doesn’t…
Tag: bjj
Cross-Training for Aikido Pt 3: Principles Over Techniques
As an aikido practitioner who wants to cross-train in more resistance-based arts, it is best to approach them using lower case ‘a’ aikido, which is a set of principles, than capital ‘A’ Aikido(TM), which is a set of techniques. One of the greatest hindrances to aikido practitioners cross-training in other, more competitive arts is the…
Grappling Is A Competition For Freedom
“In a fight, only one person can be comfortable. Your job is to transfer the comfortable from your opponent to you.” —Rickson Gracie The goal in grappling is to maintain and protect our own physical freedom, our ability to move freely and unhindered, while taking away the same in our opponent. Posture, balance, and dynamic…
Grappling Is Measured In Irimi
“Whoever controls the center, wins.” —Ellis Amdur Grappling is essentially a negotiation for space, space that one person is attempting to occupy to the detriment of the other. Takedowns, throws, pins, strangles, and joint-locks, are really all variants of taking space so that we are in control of it and our opponent is not. In…
Cross-Training For Aikido Pt 2: Reigi
If we are truly trying to embody the principles of our martial practice, we must be able to do so in all environments, even, or perhaps especially, within those environments that we perceive as hostile. There is a lot of talk in the aikido community about cross-training in grappling and/or striking arts as a means…